The beginning
Wanga Fashion began in 2002 as one of the first digital boutiques in the Netherlands, selling second-hand designer clothing on eBay. In 2004, we opened our first physical shop on Kinkerstraat in Amsterdam, a wonderful venture that lasted five years.
During those early years, music was always present. Alongside fashion, Dulce developed a long-standing career as a DJ, playing regularly in clubs and events across Europe and beyond. Music was never separate from what we were building. It shaped the atmosphere, the rhythm, and the way we related to people, spaces, and moments.
In 2016, after spending several years in Dubai and Berlin working in clothing, styling, and music within the fashion industry, Wanga Fashion returned home with a clear intention: to become an expression of everything we had learned and loved along the way.
The digital years
By 2016, a growing number of luxury Preloved fashion marketplaces had emerged: Vestiaire Collective, Rebelle, VideDressing, The Next Closet, The RealReal, among others.
We chose to give full exposure to our entire collection through these platforms, and the response was fantastic. At the time, we considered launching our own online shop for direct sales, but the costs and effort required for maintenance and marketing led us to make a different decision: to operate as a fully digital business, selling exclusively through selected marketplaces.
And so we did. Half of our home slowly transformed into storage for the collection, while work happened mostly from the living room and the garden. As property prices rose exponentially (around the same time as the COVID period) staying in Utrecht became increasingly difficult. By the end of 2020, we were faced with a simple but decisive question: where next?
Brunssum, coming back to place
After exploring different options across the Netherlands, we felt that Limburg offered the right conditions for us, both professionally and personally. We began looking for a house with a shop on the ground floor. The idea was simple: to go back to basics while keeping our online work alive. To separate our business from our living space. To spend time with people face to face. To bring together everything we had learned and everything we loved.
We missed the human side of traditional businesses: small conversations, shared moments, good music playing in the background. Fixing things. Creating. Taking time. Presence shining as beautiful aesthetics. We wanted that back, badly.
The intention was to create a space that truly expressed who we are, and to share it with you.
And then we found a place at Kerkstraat 7. Why Brunssum? There isn’t really a clear reason. We had been around the area for some time, looking, and life simply brought us here. It could have been another town nearby, but it just happened to be here. We took the opportunity, and here we are, in this beautiful little town.
Since December 2022, Wanga Fashion lives in Brunssum. Dulce is at the heart of the shop, shaping its daily rhythm with care and attention. From this place, the physical shop and our online store exist as one. The digital extends the experience of the space, allowing Wanga Fashion to reach beyond its walls while remaining rooted here.
At Home. ❤️
